When the tide goes out.

This week, it feels like the tide went out. And I’m left waiting for it to come in again.

It seems like there’s an ocean between what I want to feel (hopeful and helpful) and how I actually feel (fearful and frustrated, angry and anxious) now that the Presidential election in the US has been decided.

I spent Wednesday morning at the Cape running errands, grabbing a quiet moment at the beach before returning to the city. I watched the waves reach the shore and was reminded of something I wrote a few years ago: Don’t get your eyebrows waxed when you’re sad. It includes a simple list of things you can do during life’s low tide moments, including avoiding above-the-eye grooming and feeling upset when you’re upset.

When I revisited that post, I wasn’t surprised at all to see I’d written about the ocean in that particular moment of upset-ness:

During the day, I watched the tide’s cycle and couldn’t help but be moved by the natural order of things. Sometimes the tide is high, and we are carried atop the waves. And sometimes the tide pulls out, and we’re left feeling very small, a bit lost and a little abandoned. Inevitably, though, the tide comes back in. And so it goes with life. Sometimes we’re up. And sometimes we’re down.

I think it’s okay to sit with our feelings (whatever they may be) for a bit (while not sitting still for too long… there is work to be done, after all). And if you need someone there by your side, you know where to find me.